Tuesday, September 18, 2012

The Story of a Chair

This summer I had plans to do some decorating for my mom. I made her a quilt for Christmas and so I originally was going to work on her master bedroom but somehow it morphed into curtains and chairs in her living room/dining area. My sister-in-law came to help me, and thank goodness, because this is not a one person job!! Pregnancy saps so much of my energy so we didn't get nearly as much completed as I had hoped but we did finish one of the two wingback chairs in the living room! I used Tiffany's blog post for inspiration and tried to follow in her footsteps of using as much of the chair as possible. We used some of the tack strips and the piping and all of the padding and cushioning. I think that saved us a lot of money and a lot of headaches! Here's how it all went down:

We started by removing the back. Its important to remember how the pieces are attached. We did the whole project in four days so that made it easier, but if you were going to spread it out over time: pictures, pictures, pictures!

Then we removed the sides.

Lots and lots of staples to remove!

You might also want to have a small vaccuum ready. There was a lot of dust and pet hair (from the former owners, my mom doesn't have pets) from years of use built up in there. Fun.

My dad thought we were making it look to hard. Then he found out how hard it really was!

Eventually we got the chair down to this. Our padding was still in really good shape, so we didn't mess with that. Other tutorials will tell you to take it down to the bare bones and build up with all new padding. I say, if you don't have to don't do that! I can't imagine how much harder that would have made this project.

This is when the project started getting exciting. We could see the beauty start to shine through the mess and exhaustion!

From the front you almost couldn't tell it still had a long long way to go!

And we ended right where we started, by putting on the back of the chair.

From the side. One thing I love about this chair is the piping. We did it in a coordinating solid blue. Its a little hard to tell but it really makes it pop.

I feel bad we only had time for one! We're going to have to do the other at Christmas time (joy). In the mean time my mom is keeping this one covered so they don't wear unevenly.

We made a lot of mistakes a long the way! But thankfully no one will ever know but us. If you have any questions about this project feel free to email me at kimmisue22@gmail.com (yeah, yeah, my email is weird. I'd change it if it wouldn't be such a huge hassle.)

About Me

I have been teaching Interior Design for four years at Bingham High School in South Jordan UT. I love creating fun and relaxing spaces using a mix of new and DIY. I'm excited to share my ideas with you!!